Kathleen Hughes, Known for Her Role in ‘It Came From Outer Space,’ Dies at 96

The actress died on May 19; an official cause of death has not been given.

Kathleen Hughes participates in a symposium honoring the late actress Marilyn Monroe in Los Angeles on Aug. 5, 2005. Amanda Edwards/Getty Images

Kathleen Hughes, an actress who graced screens during Hollywood’s “Golden Age” of cinema, famously portraying the wide-eyed blonde “scream queen” in the 1953 cult classic “It Came from Outer Space,” died on Monday at the age of 96.

Hughes’s death was confirmed by her close friend, John Griffin-Atil, who described the film star as being a “kind, extraordinary woman.”

“Oh, she could tell stories of old Hollywood,” Griffin-Atil wrote in a Facebook post on Tuesday. “What a fabulous person I’m fortunate to have known her.”

Born in Los Angeles on Nov. 14, 1928, Hughes was destined for a career in show business. As the niece of playwright F. Hugh Herbert, a young Hughes often accompanied the screenwriter on his movie sets as a child, which sparked her desire to star in films.

“I loved that, it was just wonderful,” she told Film Talk in 2004, recalling the time she spent with her uncle. “I thought, ‘I want to be an actress.’”

Hughes’s dream came true in 1948 when she landed a contract with 20th Century Fox. At the suggestion of the production company, now called 20th Century Studios, the starlet, born Elizabeth Margaret von Gerkan, adopted her stage name. She went on to make her onscreen debut later that year with a role in the noir thriller “Road House.”

In 1952, Hughes signed with Universal-International, a move that proved pivotal in her career. She garnered a small yet memorable part in the 1953 sci-fi film “It Came from Outer Space,” directed by Jack Arnold. The film, which served as Universal’s first 3D film, marked Hughes’s breakout role.

That same year, the actress appeared alongside actor Rock Hudson in “The Golden Blade” and starred in Hugo Haas’s drama “Thy Neighbor’s Wife.” She also reunited with Arnold for the crime noir “The Glass Web”—one of Hughes’s favorite roles, according to her IMDb biography.

Hughes was also active on the small screen, appearing in “Perry Mason,” “I Dream of Jeannie,” “Mission: Impossible,” “The Ghost & Mrs. Muir,” “Bracken’s World,” “M*A*S*H,” and “Barnaby Jones,” among other television shows.

In 1954, the actress married screenwriter Stanley Rubin, who died in 2014 at the age of 96. The couple had four children: daughter Angie, and sons Michael, John, and Chris, the latter of whom passed away in 2008 at age 49 due to complications from cancer.